


Blood in the Trenches

by kaxen



Series: The Vampire of Downton [1]
Category: Downton Abbey
Genre: AU, Gen, vampire
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-04
Updated: 2013-12-04
Packaged: 2018-01-03 10:57:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,850
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1069656
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kaxen/pseuds/kaxen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Thomas contemplates life and death in the trenches.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Blood in the Trenches

“So I’ve been thinking, what could be more useful than what you do? Bringing people back to health, back to life.”

Oh the absurdity of a vicious creature of the night offering to be a medic. Though the fact of the matter was that he hadn’t really ever gotten very much killing done. Of course, he had thought about it at times. It was very much impossible to avoid those impulses, especially when he was incredibly hungry. But the trouble with being a bloodsucker rather than a man-eater was that it was rather troublesome to dispose of the evidence. It was enough trouble to hide his lesser transgressions, like stolen bottles of wine. Hiding an entire corpse would be very difficult. It was much easier to prey on pests no one would miss and occasionally take a nip from the maids and hall boys. Human blood was much more palatable and invigorating than the blood of a little rat. 

As long as no one else saw them, it would go entirely unnoticed. Thomas would have loved to have the ability to control people’s minds because then he could make everything go his way. However, his effect on people was limited to a short-range, just enough that no one ever seemed to remember he had bitten them. They always wandered away from him in a daze once he finished with them. He only ever took small sips. The wounds he left on other’s necks always healed in a day or two, so with all the work to be done, it was easily forgotten. 

He had slipped up a few times, like when he had bared his fangs at William for punching him. He knew they were whispering about him. He could hear it through the walls. They certainly liked William more than they ever liked him and wouldn’t be opposed to getting rid of him. It was probably best to make an exit now, especially after being thought of as a thief. He possibly should stop trying to push his luck, but on account he just signed up to go to war, maybe not any time soon.

When everything was settled, he handed in his notice. Thomas told himself that he certainly wasn’t going to miss Downton.

***

Thomas sat down in the trenches late one night, wondering about mortality and his lack of it. He had stuck his head out a few times, but the effects didn’t last particularly long, though it did give the others quite a shock. When they had found his helmet with holes in it but his head seemingly unscathed, they had called it a miracle. If only they knew. As far as Thomas was concerned, it would be a miracle if he could turn into a unicorn instead. People liked unicorns. At least people were generally rather sad when unicorns died, slaughtered for their horn. Thomas was fairly certain no one would miss him.

Almost everyone was asleep, or trying to fall asleep, at this hour. Every so often, someone would yelp, either from nightmares or pain. He heard flapping wings, which was rather odd since many birds were shot down for the suspicion that they might be messenger pigeons. With the exception of a scavenger bird willing to take its chances, there wasn’t much in the form of flying animals.

Suddenly he noticed something landing beside him.

“Fancy that. Another vampire,” a voice said quietly. 

Thomas’s eyes went up from the soldier’s puttees to his face. The fellow smelled rather bloody.

“What?” Thomas muttered. He vaguely remembered being told that other vampires could pick each other out regardless of any attempts to hide. Even though he knew nearly no one could see him very well in the darkness, Thomas felt safer maintaining a human façade. He liked his blue eyes much better than his red ones. The pointy ears were not too bad, but they were odd. The fangs made him feel like some kind of wild animal. 

The soldier bent down to look Thomas in the eye.

“Someone must have made you. I can’t imagine you think you’re the only one,” the soldier said with a short laugh. His eyes were dark and red, and his fangs showed as he spoke. 

“I wasn’t expecting to see another vampire,” Thomas said.

“No one expects vampires, old sport,” he laughed, “How has the war been treating you?”

“I can’t say I am feeling well,” Thomas said. He was quite sick of all this pointlessness. Thomas certainly wasn’t here because he was patriotic. He had thought it weak-willed when he saw the first soldier to break from the war, but now he was wondering how much longer he could hold on. He had even been missing Downton.

“Oh really? The eating is so good in a stalemate like this. Though all the fear and sadness in the blood sometimes makes me feel itchy all over,” the soldier said. 

“Are you sure it isn’t the lice?” Thomas asked.

“Lice don’t like vampires. Good thing too. Can you imagine an immortal louse on the loose?” the soldier chuckled. Thomas snorted.

“I don’t think I’ve seen you before. How long have you been a vampire?” the soldier asked. 

“Four years,” Thomas replied.

“Oh a baby! I haven’t seen a baby in a long time. Whose thrall are you?” the soldier asked.

“Nobody’s,” Thomas replied. He gritted his teeth thinking about the Duke of Crowborough. Four years wasn’t enough to entirely dull his bitterness for having been pulled into the world of the undead and then promptly abandoned. 

“Oooh. I hit the baby’s nerves,” the soldier laughed.

“Stop calling me that,” Thomas growled. He wasn’t in the mood for someone so giggly about the whole matter. And, looking at the soldier’s uniform, he certainly wasn’t going to take mocking from a private.

“What should I call you then?” the soldier asked.

“Corporal Barrow. And who are you?” Thomas replied.

“I’m Private Archibert Bryant for now,” the soldier said.

“Just for now? Are you getting promoted or a spy?” Thomas asked.

“When you live to 206, you pick up quite a few extra identities,” Archibert said. “Don’t tell me you haven’t any plans for when everyone realizes you can’t grow old.”

“I have plans,” Thomas lied. He hadn’t really thought that far ahead, especially now when he wasn’t sure if he could handle a couple more days.

“New vampires are so adorable to have around. But it’s my policy to never make a new thrall when everyone is feeling desperate. Fear and reasonable long-term judgment don’t go together,” Archibert said.

“I don’t think reasonable long-term judgment is always present in peacetime either. Isn’t that why we’re at war?” Thomas scoffed as he pulled out a cigarette. He didn’t bother to offer Archibert one.

“That’s true,” Archibert laughed.

“Why do you got to be so giggly?” Thomas scowled as he lit his cigarette, covering the flame as best he could. 

“What’s the point of living if you can’t find any joy in anything?” Archibert asked. 

Archibert took a closer look at Thomas’s uniform, eyeing the cross on his sleeve“Oh. You’re a medic? Why would you do that to yourself? How can you stand to be a medic in all this? All that food right in front of your face!” Archibert asked. He licked his lips as he thought about all the blood.

“And really. I’m sure a few of the boys would not object to a mercy killing. Going blind and legless and all that mess,” Archibert said, “It certainly isn’t unethical to kill people who want to die.”

“That’s not my business. I’m simply not interested in going over the top,” Thomas said. 

“I joined this war because I couldn’t stand to see all this good food go to waste. Nice young healthy men are delicious,” Archibert said, “Almost as good as nice young women, but people get so upset when a girl dies before her time. And they can be rather nervous creatures.”

“It’s all a waste,” Thomas nodded. 

“But on the other hand, it is only during war when people are more willing to accept me. Desperation is a wonderful motivator for equalization,” Archibert said, “My commanding officer was very happy about it. How can England lose if one soldier can’t ever die?”

“Two,” Thomas said.

“Even better. We’ll save England and destroy those blasted Huns, if only by outliving them if that is required,” Archibert nodded with a smile.

“You’re absolutely ridiculous,” Thomas scoffed.

***

Mortar shells were falling down around the trenches. Dirt and dust flew everywhere.

Thomas ducked and held his helmet down. He was slumped almost all the way down. Beside him a man bled and another tried to stop the bleeding.

“Thomas?” a voice called “It is Thomas, isn’t it?” 

Thomas looked up to see Matthew Crawley.

“It’s Corporal Barrow now, Mr. Crawley,” Thomas croaked.

“You’ll never guess where I’ve just been,” Matthew said. 

***

The footsteps were very quiet and quick. The soldier wasn’t carrying any light at all despite the moonless night. It could only be Archibert.

Archibert leaned to the side a little bit and waved at Thomas. 

“Hello there,” Archibert said.

“I hope you are not under the impression we are friends now,” Thomas said, glaring at Archibert.

“You need to soften up a little. Our lives are far too long to spend all grumpy,” Archibert said as he sat down beside Thomas. He ran his fingers along the edges of his mouth.

“I have plenty of reasons to be cross,” Thomas grumbled.

“Of course it takes time to get used to feeling like you’re the odd one out and hiding your true nature,” Archibert said with an understanding smile and a light pat on Thomas’ shoulder.

“I’ve never really fit in with anybody,” Thomas said, as he moved away slightly from Archibert. Archibert knew nothing. 

“Oh,” Archibert’s grin disappeared.

Thomas pulled out a cigarette. 

“What have you been doing with your rations?” Archibert asked.

“Selling and trading here and there. Cigarettes and little things,” Thomas said as he lit the cigarette, cupping his hand around the flame to cover the light.

“What is the point of smoking?” Archibert asked.

“It gives me something to do with my mouth when I can’t eat,” Thomas said. 

“I nicked this lighter off some dead fellow in No Man’s Land. Any interest?” Archibert asked as he held a lighter in front of Thomas. 

“Maybe a little,” Thomas said as he took it to look more closely. It was a bit fancier than the one he had. 

“Is this a trade or a gift?” Thomas asked suspiciously.

“I can afford for it to be a gift,” Archibert said, “Someone has to be sweet to a poor fellow like you.”

“I don’t want your pity,” Thomas said.

“It’s not pity,” Archibert said.

“Then what would you call it?” Thomas asked.

“Being pleasant? Why do you have to be so angry at a gift?” Archibert said.

“I’m not angry,” Thomas said as he looked away. He didn’t really believe Archibert was simply being pleasant, though he was yet to think of what ulterior motives the vampire had. 

“How do you feel about getting some German for dinner?” Archibert asked as he rubbed his hands together and licked his lips. 

“Not interested in getting shot at,” Thomas said.

“Your creeping abilities need work if you think we’ll have a mob of Huns on our tail,” Archibert laughed.

Thomas grumbled. 

“I can teach you more, if you want. One can never be too sneaky really,” Archibert said.

“I’m willing to agree with you on that,” Thomas said as all of his plotting back at Downton came to mind. It all felt a little petty now. 

“You’re not going to get into trouble, nipping people, you know. When they get shell shock, they’re pretty easy to deal with,” Archibert said, “Not like they care what happens when they get to that point. Almost like they don’t even know where they are anymore. At least Heaven would be nice and warm. But Hell would be far too warm!”

“Then where do we go?” Thomas asked. He hadn’t ever been fully convinced of killing himself, but he was curious. He probably knew someone willing to decapitate him and stab him through the heart, it was more of a question of which feature of his that they hated most about him rather than whether they hated him.  

“Hell, I guess. Then the devil lines us all up and asks us how many people we’ve murdered,” Archibert laughed.

“I am behind my quota,” Thomas said.

“Maybe you should fix that,” Archibert suggested and pulled Thomas’s arm. Thomas shook his head. 

***

The ground rumbled with another bombardment. Thomas regained his footing as he carried the stretcher. Men were shouting and milling about the trenches. 

“Bloody hell. There must be more to life than this!” Thomas shouted.

Another mortar round crashed near them. The stretcher tilted to the side as they dropped it. Thomas flinched, whimpering. 

“You all right, corporal?”

Thomas heaved for a few moments trying to get his bearings.

“I think so,” Thomas gasped, “Yeah, more or less.”

He panted and shifted the position of his helmet. He checked on the man they had been carrying, but he was dead. 

“You won’t believe it back home where I come from. I thought, ‘Medical Corps. Not much danger there.’ How wrong can one man be? Here,” his fellow stretcher-bearer handed him a cigarette.

Thomas took the cigarette. 

“I think it comes down to luck. If the bullet’s got your name on it, there’s nothing you can do.”

Thomas blew out a big cloud of smoke. 

“You thank God, you’re—

A bullet went through his head.

Thomas shook as his body flopped down in front of him, and he tried to move away, though there wasn’t any place to go in the trenches. 

It felt like the whole place was shrinking around him.

“Get these bodies away!”

“Come on, Corporal Barrow!” an officer shouted.

Thomas whimpered and slowly picked himself back up. 

***

Thomas rubbed his head. It had all started as a trace of an idea, but it grew in appeal as the war continued. He had envied the men who were able to leave. He was becoming quite certain he needed to get out of here; he just needed to settle his plans. He had to think of a way to injure himself without it looking like he had done it on purpose so he could be sent home, but being able to heal so quickly added some difficulty. He had stopped bothering to drink blood to weaken himself, and he had collected some garlic to make the damage remain longer. The smell was driving him mad. It was impossible to know how good of a shot anyone was, and he certainly couldn’t keep sticking himself into danger until he got shot in a manner he preferred. He also needed to know what he was going to do afterwards. 

All this starvation made holding up his human façade rather difficult.

The sound of footsteps interrupted his thoughts. 

“Hello, old sport,” Archibert said. He had a bloody smell about him, or bloodier at least; there was always someone bleeding somewhere, so the smell of blood was pervasive. His skin looked a little rosier. He licked his lips contentedly.  

“Back again,” Thomas muttered as he lit a cigarette.

“No one else is willingly awake at this hour,” Archibert laughed, “I certainly can’t bother people standing watch.”

He stopped and sniffed the air for a moment. 

“Why do I smell garlic?” Archibert asked.

“It can be used to disinfect wounds,” Thomas replied. 

“You should probably stick to more modern medicine,” Archibert remarked.

The vampire shifted his position. 

“You look so pale every time I see you. Have you eaten at all?” Archibert asked.

“Not really,” Thomas replied.

“I can’t imagine you’re friends with anybody here, so it’s not sentiment holding you back,” Archibert said.

“There isn’t much point in making friends when people drop like flies,” Thomas said. 

“I promise I won’t die on you,” Archibert said.

“Should I thank you, private?” Thomas scoffed.

“We can be more casual than that,” Archibert said, “We can be friends.”

He put his hand on Thomas’s shoulder and squeezed lightly. Thomas moved away from him.

“Are you unaccustomed to being unliked?” Thomas asked. He gave Archibert a bit of a withering look.

“Are you sure the problem isn’t that you are unaccustomed to being liked?” Archibert asked.

“You’re a very tiring person,” Thomas grumbled as he blew a big puff of smoke. Archibert shifted the helmet on his head.

“You aren’t aiming to get a blighty, are you?” Archibert asked, squinting his eyes.

“What if I am?” Thomas asked. 

Archibert gave an exasperated sigh.

“You’d think straighter if you had some food in your stomach. I have some blood in my canteen. Kind of rotten compared to fresh blood, but better than nothing,” Archibert said.

“So that’s what I’ve been smelling,” Thomas remarked. 

Archibert pulled the top off his canteen and swung the opening in front of Thomas’s nose.

“You know you want to take a drink,” Archibert said.

Thomas pushed Archibert’s hand away, even though the smell tempted him quite terribly at this point.

“Oh for Heaven’s sake. Why do you bother being a vampire?” Archibert asked.

“I bother because I don’t see why I ought to just give up,” Thomas replied, “All your talk about mercy killing and picking off the people who can’t handle it! It’s all very irritating.” 

“A proper predator picks out the weakest ones of the herd,” Archibert said, “It ensures the proper survival of the species. Natural selection and all of that.”

“That goes a bit awry when applied humans,” Thomas said. 

“What makes you say that? How poor is your breeding?” Archibert smirked.

“Shut up,” Thomas scowled.  

“Oh, it was just a joke!” Archibert said.

Thomas kept glaring at Archibert.

“I was a farm boy, really. Though I suppose I’m more on the side of the wolves now. What did you do before the war?” Archibert asked.

“I was a footman,” Thomas replied.

“You miss it?” Archibert asked.

“I think anything is better than here,” Thomas said. 

“I’m pretty sure you’d be happier trying my way. 206 years of trial and error can’t be that wrong,” Archibert said.

“Being old is no guarantee of being right,” Thomas said. There were plenty of old institutions making him miserable. 

“You’re a stubborn bloke,” Archibert said. 

“Compromising is something I prefer not to do,” Thomas said.

“You better be careful. If they end up wanting to shoot you for cowardice, there is going to be a lot of trouble,” Archibert said.

“I can sort it out fine,” Thomas said, though he wasn’t entirely sure if he believed himself. He had been thinking about doing it for some time now, but he also had his future to worry about. Of course he wasn’t going to admit this to Archibert. The damned vampire spent too much time telling him he was going about things incorrectly often enough, and worse yet, he would never stop laughing about it and speaking in the tone of voice someone uses on small children.

“I guess I’ll give you my last bit of information, not that you listen. In London, there is a club for people like us. It’s rather fun,” Archibert said, “Maybe you can find a kindred spirit.”

Archibert pulled out a notepad, and he wrote an address on it and handed it to Thomas.

“If you’re going to be there, I can’t imagine it would be much fun,” Thomas said as he crumpled the paper into his pocket. 

“Oh, you are so cruel,” Archibert said with a look of fake hurt. 

***

Thomas sat in a shelter having tea, or at least pretending to. What warmth he absorbed from holding the cup helped him feel at least a little better.

“You look very comfortable there, corporal,” Matthew said.

Thomas arose and came out. He saluted Matthew, who returned the gesture.

“Would you like some, sir?” Thomas asked, “We’ve got condensed milk and sugar.”

“I won’t ask how you managed that,” Matthew said.

Thomas poured Matthew a drink while Matthew removed his helmet. He handed a cup to Matthew.

“Go on, sir,” Thomas said.

Thomas removed his helmet. Matthew took a sip.

“That’s nectar. You sure you can spare it?” Matthew asked.

He could spare all of it, though he wasn’t quite generous enough to give all of it.

“Gladly. If we could talk about the old days and forget about all this for a minute or two,” Thomas said.

“Do you ever hear from anyone?” Matthew asked.

“Oh, yes. Miss O’Brien keeps me informed. Lady Edith’s driving,” Thomas said. Matthew gave a small laugh.

“Lady Sybil’s training as a nurse. Miss O’Brien tells me the hospital’s busier than ever with the wounded coming in. That true?” Thomas asked.

“Certainly is. They had a concert when I was there to raise extra funds,” Matthew said.

“I’m curious, sir. Do you think I could ever get a transfer back to the hospital, seeing as it’s war work?” Thomas asked.

“Well, you’d have to be sent home from the front first. And then you might have to pull a few strings,” Matthew replied.

Matthew took one last sip of tea.

“Thank you for that,” Matthew said, “Thank you very much.”

“What would my mother say? Me entertaining the future Earl of Grantham for tea,” Thomas remarked.

Matthew smiled.

“War has a way of distinguishing the things that matter and the things that don’t,” Matthew said.

Thomas put his helmet back and on saluted Matthew. Matthew walked away.

Thomas blinked for a few moments. His cold, dead heart managed to get itself excited as he told himself he would do it. 

He walked through the trenches to somewhere empty and out of the line of sight of everyone around him. He put a cigarette in his mouth and pulled out the lighter Archibert had given him. He pulled the cigarette out of his mouth shakily. It did nothing to settle his nerves. 

He put the lighter in his left hand. 

He held his lighter up, closed his eyes, and waited what felt like an eternity. If he sat here too long like this someone would catch him. 

He yelped as a bullet passed through his hand.

“Thank you. Thank you for my deliverance,” Thomas gasped. He gritted his teeth as he put garlic on the wound before anyone came to see what had happened. His head pounded with thoughts of biting whoever came first. His left hand burned. 

***

Thomas ran his fingers over his gloved left hand. He was glad it had all worked. No longer having hunger gnawing at the back of his mind, at least temporarily, helped raise his spirits at least a little. The crumpled paper from Archibert was still with his things. Archibert had rather incoherent handwriting, now that he actually looked at it. His curiosity was slightly piqued about the place. 


End file.
